On the John Muir Trail
Summer 2024
I spent 16 days this summer hiking the John Muir Trail, backpacking 230 miles from Yosemite Valley down along the spine of the Sierra Nevada to Mt. Whitney. The hike was one of the happiest periods of my recent life. I’d planned to write about it, but apart from a few paragraphs about logistics, I think it’s a story best told in pictures.
The John Muir trail starts at 4000 feet of elevation in Yosemite Valley, climbs up to nearly 11000 feet above Half Dome, descends back from Tuolumne to Mammoth Lakes, then winds down through King’s Canyon and across a host of mountain passes – Selden, Glen, Muir, Pinchot, Mather, Forester – leading to Mount Whitney at 14500’. Listing off these names has a disconcerting map and the territory flavor – each one is so distinct in my memory: snow-covered Muir, the unrelenting sun of Mather, running into lost trail friends on the top of Pinchot. Each pass was a day, and the kind of day that counts each hour.
I planned to hike alone, or at least I was alone from early on. My dear friend Karthik was generous enough to drive me from SF to Yosemite and hiked with me as far as Cloud’s Rest above Half Dome before turning back. Finishing the hike 16 days later, I’d spent less than a full day alone.
Logistics: The hike is about 230 miles. It’s a backpacking trip, but there are a number of places to resupply food: you mail food ahead of you and pick it up on the way. I planned to resupply at two places: Red’s Meadow and Muir Trail Ranch, but ended up stopping in Vermillion Valley Resort (VVR) as well (which was well worth the stop for food & company). You carry between 3 and 8 days of food with you at any point, which (depending on the weight of your pack) is between 20 and 50lbs at any time. I mostly kept below 35lbs at its heaviest. My itinerary was roughly:
3 days to Red’s Meadow, where I resupplied
2 more days to Vermillion Valley Resort (VVR) (for delicious warm food)
2 more days to Muir Trail Ranch for the second resupply
8 days to Whitney (heavy packs)
My pack was close to this: https://lighterpack.com/r/p7ogse. I kept close to this, although I ended up with an extra 5-10lbs than I intended somehow.
Getting there and back: The easiest way to get to Yosemite is to drive and leave the car in Yosemite Valley, which you can park long term and collect later. I had a friend drop me off and drive back, which also worked. At the end, there’s a nice bus that drives through Lone Pine (where you finish) and can take you to the Reno airport. I also stopped in Mammoth Lakes and Truckee, which I recommend.
Distance: I averaged about 15 miles a day, all told. I did several 20 mile days and a few 10-12 mile days. You can really customize this – there are plenty of great camping spots. 20 mile days were fun but brutal for me: every day I did it I ended up feeling nauseous and rather broken physically. One of the curses of “through hiking” is the desire to keep making miles. I set out with the goal of taking a few “zero days” but on the hike I found it very hard to justify not making progress on a given day. It’s good to fight this instinct!
Apps: Far Out is an amazing app that lets you track water levels, camping spots, etc. I highly recommend although I’d encourage you not to overuse it, since it can take some of the mystery out of it.
Work: I took 2 weeks off from work for the hike. Given the weekend before and after, that was 16 days total. I took the following Monday off too to recover, but it fit pretty nicely into a (long) vacation. If you take a slower pace, 3 weeks might be more feasible.
Food tips: I fell in love with Peak Refuel meals, especially beef stroganoff and other pasta dishes. Highly caloric dinners are great. By that I mean >1000 calories. Even if you’re losing weight, a heavy dinner is enough to keep hunger at bay. Bring some olive oil and hot sauce to spice up the dinners. Also some sporadic deserts. It turns out Oreos are unbelievably calorically dense.
For breakfast, the typical advice is to bring oatmeal or granola. I mostly did oatmeal with Trader Joe’s dried fruit, which worked for me but I hated by the end. So much for oatmeal being a staple. Trader Joe’s instant coffee is great.
For lunch, tortillas with some kind of sausage is good, or these delicious chicken packets. Lunch is less important because you snack a lot, but it’s still worth it for a nice rest after a long morning.
For snacks, I ate a lot of Cliff Bars. I really like the blueberry flavor. I could have survived on only cliff bars. Bring some tea! Especially when it gets cold, warm tea is great.
Critical advice: you really should count your calories and make sure you have enough. I mostly ran out of food in the last 3 days and lost a lot of weight (which isn’t necessarily a bad thing).
A related takeaway is not to underestimate the last 8 days after MTR. The first half of the SOBO hike is by far the easiest part. Not only is the elevation gain much less, you get to carry 3 days worth of food instead of 8. I got rid of a lot of food at MTR and regretted it.
A note on calories: on the hike you learn what calories can do for you. A Cliff bar before a tough climb makes all the difference to your mood. Food has a caloric density in kcal / gram. Normal foods (that contain water) tend to be below 1. Cliff bars are around 3.8. Oreos are around 4.5. Butter is around 8. Dehydrating food is key to keeping the mass down. Something you don’t necessarily realize is that food is heavy! By far the heaviest thing in your pack all told. So pay attention to weight.
Water: The Sawyer Squeeze or some comparable water filter works well. For a group, a gravity filter might be advisable, although I think it’s good for everyone to have their own.
Entertainment: Bring a Kindle! It’s a great use for it. With an external battery you can also keep a phone alive for the whole trip with minimal use. You can recharge at most of the resupply points too. I liked bringing headphones to listen to music sometimes.
Takeaway: I can’t emphasize enough how great it was, how social it was, how easy it was to wander across someone with a very different background and spend a whole day talking to them about anything at all. It’s a really nice break from the world, and a nice way to put the professional world in perspective. Several people asked me why I wanted to do it, and I didn’t have an answer for them before I set off, but it was not something I could possibly regret. You should do it :)